English Questions For SBI Clerk Prelims 2018: 6th March 2018

Dear Aspirants,

Directions (01- 10): Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. 

From ‘apparel to aerospace’, ‘steel to software’, the pace of technological innovation is quickening. No longer can companies afford to miss generation of technology and expect to remain competitive. Adding to the pressure, innovations are increasingly crossing industry boundaries; a new fiber developed by the textile industry has potential for building materials and medical equipment. Some companies are adept at using a diversity of technologies to create new products that transform markets. But many others are floundering because they rely on a technology strategy that no longer works in such a fast changing environment. The difference between success and failure is not how much a company spends on research and development (R&D), but how it approaches it. 

There are two possible approaches. Either a company can invest in R&D that an older generation of technology the ‘break through’ approach-or its focus on combining existing technologies into hybrid technologies – the ‘technologies fusion’ approach. It blends incremental technical improvements from several previously separate field of technology to create products that revolutionise markets. 

In a world where the old maxim ‘one technology one industry’ no longer applies, a singular breakthrough strategy is inadequate; companies need to include both the breakthrough and fusion approaches in their technology strategy. Relying on breakthroughs alone fails because it focuses the R&D efforts to narrowly, ignoring the possibilities of combining technologies. Yet many western companies still rely almost exclusively – on the breakthrough approach. The reasons are complex: a distrust of outside innovations and not-invented here engineering and arrogance and aversion to sharing research results.

Q1. Which of the following is false according to the passage?

(a) Technological innovation is taking place at a fast pace

(b) All technological innovations have applicability in other industries

(c) Companies failing to adopt new technology may fail.

(d) Companies which adopt technologies of other industries have an advantage

(e) Technology becomes obsolete in a fast changing environment.

Q2. Which of the following would correctly reflect the position regarding the two approaches to technology adoption?

(a) Both the approaches are to be used at the same time

(b) ‘Breakthrough’ approach is only to be used

(c) ‘Technology fusion’ approach is only to be used

(d) ‘Breakthrough approach’ is preferable for many companies

(e) None of these

Q3. Which of the following has the same meaning as the word ‘generation’ as it has been used in-the passage?

(a) Family

(b) Class

(c) Offspring

(d) Phase

(e) Level

Q4. Which of the following features of technology has been highlighted most prominently by the author of the passage?

(a) Its improper utilization by some companies

(b) The speed at which innovations are happening

(c) The expenses involved in developing technology

(d) The two approaches to adopting technology

(e) None of these

Q5. What does the author want to highlight by using the example ‘apparel to aerospace’ and ‘steel to software’?

(a) Many industries are trying to improve technology

(b) His knowledge about the various industries

(c) The wide spread of technological innovations

(d) The speed of the technological innovation

(e) None of these

Q6. What, according to the author, is adding to the pressure on the companies? 

(a) Applicability of technologies of other industries to them 

(b) Increasing speed of technological innovations 

(c) Work load on their R & D departments 

(d) Finding funds for increased R & D activities 

(e) Demand from customers for improved products 

Q7. What is the immediate effect, according to the passage, if a company does not innovate? 

(a) It closes down. 

(b) It ceases to be competitive in the market. 

(c) The prices of its products go up. 

(d) Its R & D departments close down. 

(e) It adds pressure on itself. 

Q8. What, according to the author, is the major drawback of the breakthrough approach of technological innovation? 

(a) It is expensive to innovate with this approach. 

(b) It cannot give answers to modern technological problems. 

(c) This approach has been overused. 

(d) It cannot create new products. 

(e) It does take in development in other fields. 

Q9. Which of the following is the correct way, according to the author, of spending money on research? 

(a) Spend more money on breakthrough research. 

(b) Spend no money on breakthrough research. 

(c) Spend more money on technology fusion research. 

(d) Spend no money on technology fusion research. 

(e) None of these 

Q10. Why do Western companies avoid the technology fusion approach? 

(a) Distrust of outside researchers 

(b) Feeling that what one does alone is right 

(c) Failure to share results with others 

(d) All of the above 

(e) None of these

Directions (11- 15): Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. 

In a poor country like India, as income rises people first concentrate on increasing their consumption of what they regard as basic or more essential consumer goods. For the poor, these goods would primarily include cereals and for people at successive levels of higher income protective foods, simple non-food consumer goods, more modern, better quality non-food consumer goods and simple consumer durables, better quality consumer goods, and so on. When the demand for basic and more essential consumer goods is more or less met, demand for the next higher level of consumer goods begins to impinge on consumer decision making and their consumption increases. There is thus a hierarchy of income levels and a hierarchy of consumer goods. As incomes rise and one approaches the turning point referred to, there is an upward movement along the hierarchy in the demand for consumer goods which exhibits itself in a relative increase in the demand for these goods. 

If one examines the past consumption behaviour of households in India, one finds confirmation of the proposition just made. Until the mid-seventies one notices a rise in the proportion of consumption expenditure on cereals, and thereafter, a steady decline reflecting a progressive increase in the relative expenditure on non-cereal or protective foods. About the same time the rising trend in the share of food in total consumption expenditure also begins to decline, raising the proportion of expenditure on non-food consumer goods. Simultaneously one also notices a sharper rise in the proportion of expenditure on consumer durables. Thus, what one sees is an upward movement in consumer demand along the hierarchy of consumer goods which amounts to a major change in consumer behaviour. There are two features of this change to which attention particularly needs to be drawn. 

If we examine the price behaviour of food items over the past several years, we find that the prices of protective foods (edible oils, pulses, sugar, meat, fish etc) have been rising more sharply than those of cereals on account of an inadequate supply response to the increase in demand. This is particularly unfortunate because it affects the poorer segments of the population, whose need to increase consumption of protective foods is being thwarted by an excessive rise in prices. In the Approach to the Seventh Plan, importance was given to edible oils, pulses and some of the other protective foods but the overall impression created was that food grains still hold the centre of the stage. Whereas it is important to meet the demand for agricultural inputs to sustain the impetus of food grain production and to reduce the regional imbalance in agriculture development, the thrust of agricultural policy now must be more on increasing availability of protective food at reasonable prices. 

Q11. As income rises in a poor country like India, the poor people concentrate on increasing their consumption of 

(a) protein foods 

(b) modern, non-food consumer goods 

(c) cereals 

(d) protective foods 

(e) All

Q12. Whenever there is a decline in the proportion of consumption expenditure on cereals 

(a) it reflects an increase in the expenditure on non-cereal protective foods.

(b) it does not reflect an increase in the expenditure on non-cereal or protective food. 

(c) it reflects a further increase in the expenditure of cereal foods. 

(d) Both (a) and (b)

(e) None of these 

Q13. For the poor, the basic consumer goods include items like 

(a) edible oils and pulses 

(b) non-cereal protective food 

(c) meat and fish 

(d) cereals

(e) eggs

Q14. Prices of protective food have risen because

(a) prices of cereals have come down. 

(b) there is no agricultural development. 

(c) there is inadequate supply to demand. 

(d) price of non-cereal food has come down. 

(e) None of these

Q15. In the approach to the seventh plan, the overall impression was that priority should be given to  

(a) food grains 

(b) protective foods

(c)  non-food products 

(d) the identification of consumer behavior

(e) consumer satisfaction

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